TAVARES — With bee populations dramatically decreasing globally in recent years, many area residents have decided to create backyard beehives to help continue to pollinate their gardens and have their own honey.

To help with the efforts to maintain healthy bee populations in Lake, the University of Florida's Lake County Extension Office is hosting "The Buzz on Bees" at 10:30 a.m. Saturday at the Lake County Agriculture Center, 1951 Woodlea Road.

Extension agents and state specialist Jeanette Klopchin, lab manager and extension technician from the the UF entomology department's honeybee-research laboratory, will focus on how honeybees play an important role in fruit and vegetable production, which plants will attract and feed honeybees and basic knowledge about how participants can successfully keep their own bees.

"There has been a lot interest in this extremely beneficial insect, not only locally but worldwide, and we always want to be responsive to the needs of our community, who are all invested in the health and well-being of honeybees," said Megan Brew, livestock and natural resources extension agent for Lake.

Commercial beekeepers Mario and Shelly Jakob, owners of D&J Apiary in Umatilla, which has been in business for 21 years, said they are lucky that their bee populations are still intact. They have 3,500 hives producing close to 600 50-gallon drums of honey annually, most of which is sold to Sue Bee Honey, headquartered in Sioux City, Iowa. Shelly Jakob said that many commercial beekeepers have lost their hives after being hired out of the area to help farmers pollinate their crops.

"The only time we go more than two hours out of Umatilla is when our bees help pollinate almonds in California each January," said Jakob, who is concerned about the state of bee colonies. "Albert Einstein said that without honeybees, it would only be four years before humans became extinct. Honeybees do not just pollinate fruits and vegetables, but alfalfa grass that feed the animals. We have seen farmers who have not been able to recover — where within a week, 40,000 of their bees just disappeared from the hives."

Brew said research is being done to uncover what exactly is behind the devastating decline of the honeybee population, and Jakob said there are more "bee-friendly" products available to consumers, but they are much more expensive, so farmers may not be able to afford them.

"Backyard hives are really needed so we can continue to pollinate, but people are not paying attention and are not seeing colony collapses other than in higher produce prices, but we are losing so much," Jakob said. "So much of that price increase is because farmers are not yielding as many crops as they did 20 years ago because of the lack of pollination from the honeybees."

Saturday's class is an introduction that will be followed by a daylong basic beekeepers course in February. Cost is $5 and registration is available at ufbuzzonbees.eventbrite.com. For more information, contact Brew or Brooke Moffis at 352-343-4101.